Holidays

For the Holiday Season we're sharing our tips to eating great food, drinking local wine, and getting out and enjoying the Greenbelt.

Seasons Greentings!

All of us at the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation want to wish you a very happy holiday and an exciting New Year. As a thank you for all of your support over the last year we're sharing two of our favourite holiday recipes. Give 'em a try -- they're easy, delicious, and can be made using in-season Ontario ingredients.

It’s almost December, and for those of us who celebrate the holiday, it's time to start thinking Christmas Trees.

While there’s no shame in lugging a well-loved plastic one up from the basement or grabbing one from a nearby store, if you’ve never chosen your own tree from an Ontario Tree farm, you’re missing out.

Not only do our tree farms offer great selection--from Scotch and White pine, to Balsam, to Douglas Fir--they're also just fun to visit.

So if you’re up for an adventure this year, why not grab your own Greenbelt-grown tree.

To make it easy we’ve put together a list of Greenbelt Christmas Tree farms open for business this holiday session. Every Farm on our list not only offers a variety pre-cut and cut-your-own trees, they also offer warm drinks and family fun events.

Support local producers, get outside, and get yourself Greenbelt-grown tree.

It’s the ornaments, remembered for years and years, taken in and out of musty boxes, that I miss most about the Christmas trees of my childhood… even the tackiest ones. Like the bagel.

In the third grade around Christmas time, my teacher, Mrs. Mifsud, gave every student a bagel. She then brought forward a copious amount of festive adornments: fake evergreen sprigs, plastic red holly berries, gold bells, glittery bows, and tinsel. Each child was told to decorate the bagel, which acted like a wreath, with whatever holiday craft supply they desired. The bagels returned to us after a weekend with Mrs. Mifsud, given to us as hard, shellacked, inedible ornaments. I had that bagel for probably a decade (in perfect condition, might I add) before I reluctantly agreed to throw it out.

For some of us who celebrate Christmas, the procuring of a Yuletide tree is written into our memories. The scent of fir, spruce, or pine is carried throughout the house and with it comes a seasonal excitement for food, family, and festivity. One of my favourite authors, Tom Robbins, taught me that it's our sense of smell that triggers the most rich and evocative memories. The olfactory bulb, the receptor of odours, is connected to a part of the brain called the limbic system, an area closely associated with memory and emotion. It's no surprise that Christmas is a beloved holiday for many with its generous feast, its potpourri and pomanders, and its cheerful trees; it's built into our noses and our memories.

The best gift giver this holiday season isn't going to be your mother, your grandma (sorry, g-ma), or even your sweet, thoughtful partner... no, it's going to be the Greenbelt! Because Ontario's Greenbelt gives pretty generously every day of the year, providing fresh water, clean air, delicious local food, and some of the best tobogganing hills in the Province free of charge.

Growing up in the Greenbelt was especially fun during the holiday season! Every year my family would drive out to a local tree farm and hike around to find the best tree we could. However, because our hard hearts had been softened by all of the Christmas cheer, we came home annually with a tree that looked less like the one in Clark Griswold'sliving room and more like the sad little tree (but the one most in need of love and warmth) from A Charlie Brown Christmas.

Christmas is just around the corner! With this in mind, staff at the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation compiled some festive fun happening around Ontario's Greenbelt. Take your family on a twelve days of Greenbelt tour! Make your holiday memories all Greenbelt grown!

Ontario's Greenbelt stretches across 1.8 million acres and offers many options for romantic getaways. From enchanting winery experiences along the Niagara Escarpment, to the exploration of Rouge Park in Markham, one can find the romance in the nature all around the Greater Golden Horseshoe area. It is all about the birds and the bees after all, isn't it?

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Ontario’s Greenbelt is the solution for fresh air, clean water, healthy local food, active outdoor recreation, and a thriving economy. At almost 2 million acres, it’s the world’s largest permanently protected greenbelt, keeping our farmlands, forests, wetlands safe and sustainable.The Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation works to help keep farmers successful, strengthen local economies, and protect and grow natural features.